STEVENSON

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Julie Stevenson Prof. Carleton Expository Writing December 28, 2010 WC: 1694

Ideals are not so Ideal

 Throughout history there has always been a leader of the people. Some leaders led for the good of the people and others led to gain all the control they could muster. Either way each shared the ability to woo the masses to put their faith in them or their ideas. Good leaders left their mark of society while bad leaders tried but failed time and time again. Of those infamous leaders, many imposed their ideals on the masses to retain more control than was fairly dealt to them. Although their shrewd tactics may work for sometime, they always fail in the end except for the method used in Brave New World which more or less mastered how to control the masses with the ideals imposed upon them by their leaders.

What causes people to need to assume power over other people in the first place? As was stated in the Neurgroschel’s book of Yiddish folktales, in “A tale of a King who forced Jews to convert”, it is necessary to have a king or the people would not know what to do. Mustapha Mond reiterates this with his story about Cyprus Island, filled with Alphas who had no ruler. By the time almost everyone killed one another, the survivors were begging to have the government obtain rule again. As you can see from these two examples it is necessary to have a hierarchy to keep control over the land. In the case of the white southern plantation owners, they “seemed unequivocally certain in their belief that God had created them superior to those of African origin” (Earl 10). Here the slave masters believed that they were meant to rule over these peons under them, only as Mother Nature would have it, or so they thought. Regardless of what the reason for desiring control over others, some desire it for the wrong reasons.

Rulers use different mechanisms to gain power over “their” people, for example Hypnopædia was used in Brave New World, while Christianity was imposed upon African-Americans. Adolf Hitler used false propaganda to lure the frustrated masses struck by the inflation and depression in the 1920s (Huxley). White southerners converted African Americans into Christians so that their slaves would not retaliate against them for the inhumane deeds down against them. With forgiveness and love as two of the main components of Christianity, the act of retaliation was looked down upon by God and was not likely to be carried out if the slave was a true Christian. Yolanda Pierce stated in her book, //Hell Without Fires//, that “Christianity represents a contradictory faith for African Americans; its signs, symbols, words, and messages were used to physically and mentally enslave” (3). Binding African Americans by the Ten Commandments, one being, to love your neighbor as yourself, they were caught in a morality war with themselves every time they were wronged against. The choice to sin or do right by their brother in Christ was now presented. However their “identification with Jesus as God’s embodied sufferer gave slaves the courage to sacrifice their own bodies for Jesus’ gift of freedom. It often lit a passionate fire in their souls that drove them to take a daring posture of courage. Neither the driver’s lashes upon their backs, nor salt and paper rubbed into their wounds could keep them from their resolve to follow Jesus” (Earl 127). Having Jesus in their lives helped them get through the tough times as did it help the slave masters get away with their evil doings without a scratch. “When all other arguments for continuing chattel slavery failed, the Bible’s teaching for “slaves to obey their masters” succeeded,” and as Christianity was pushed upon slaves, that verse was one they would never forget (Pierce 3). Like Hitler said, “only constant repetition will finally succeed in imprinting an idea upon the memory of a crowd,” which is why hypnopædia worked so well in controlling the adult minds in Brave New World (Huxley). Other than using repetition to ensure key phrases stuck with African Americans, white southerners may have found that Christianity was a useful control mechanism for the same reason Hitler did: “Hitler,” wrote Hermann Rauschning in 1939, “has a deep respect for the Catholic church and the Jesuit order; not because of their Christian doctrine, but because of the ‘machinery’ they have elaborated and controlled, their hierarchical system, their extremely clever tactics, their knowledge of human nature and their wise use of human weaknesses in ruling over believers” (Huxley). While some slave masters favored the teaching of Christianity for those exact reasons, others Christian masters found themselves at a moral dilemma between the teachings of Christianity and slavery.

Despite how Christianity was supposed to teach their slaves to obey their masters, this ideal outcome did not come to fruition as the white man had expected and hoped it would. The first unexpected outcome occurred due to the behavior of the white slave masters themselves. Those that took the moral teachings of Christianity serious, as Riggins Earl said in his book //Dark Symbols, Obscure Signs//, “could never be content to see the enslavement of Africans as being a mere economic or political issue…slavery was a social problem that required their ethical and theological engagement” (10). The slave masters that thought like this were confronted with the problem of keeping slaves under their power. They had not yet realized that their method of empowerment was flawed with their own religious beliefs. The question they asked themselves to get closer to this realization was, “Can we teach slaves to think of themselves as being absolutely worthless before God without being guilty of thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought before God?” (Earl 22). While slave masters slowly unraveled the faults in their mastermind plan, African Americans caught on to them too. A rather clever use of reverse psychology perhaps occurred when “slaves, using their masters’ fragmented teaching of the Bible, spiritually resisted their masters’ reduction of them to mere puppetry status. This fact made it very difficult for masters to gain absolute control over their slaves” (Earl 9). This was another outcome, unexpected to occur when they began converting African Americans to Christianity. Expecting conversion to Christianity to be the key to absolute control wound up imperfect with enough fault lines African Americans to pass by their masters, sometimes all the way to the North.

Mustapha Mond, however more successful he was in controlling his lot of people than slave masters were, still ran into glitches in his control mechanisms as did Hitler. Aware of a world before the World State, Mond had seen it all and acquired enough knowledge to know that being happy was the key to life. As Hitler said, “the propagandist should adopt ‘a systematically one-sided attitude towards every problem that has to be dealt with.’ He must never admit that he might be wrong or that people with a different point of view might be even partially right” (Huxley). Hitler and Mond made the masses believe everything was right by their account, which is why Bernard looked horrified when John the savage disagreed with Mustapha Mond, the controller, during their conversation in his office. Bernard knew nothing other than the controller is always right. Yet this is where Mond and Hitler differ, in that Hitler believed, “Opponents should not be argued with; they should be attacked, shouted down, or, if they become too much of a nuisance, liquidated. The morally squeamish intellectual may be shocked by this kind of thing” (Huxley). Being an intellectual as one of the only people who possessed books, the controller knew not everyone would behave as they should in accordance to the way of the World State. Instead of ‘liquidating’ them, he entertained their individual thinking as it reminded him of himself at one time, but once he came back to the reality he lived in at that point, he exiled the imprisoned, individual to a secluded island where he could be free. This kept these procedures quiet and still honored his ideal way of life by allowing individuals to be in the pursuit of happiness, instead of it being expected. This is what made Mond more successful than Hitler. Instead of making everyone happy like Hitler said was necessary in order to control the masses, Hitler started using blatantly obvious immoral tactics which eventually led to his downfall.

The World State kept the best control of their people out of the three examples examined due to factors built into the World State. To start, the leaders created an ideal world based around what they assumed the masses would desire most. Making COMMUNITY part of the three-pronged motto of the World State reiterated the necessity for community not individuality. Because, “among the masses ‘instinct is supreme, and from instinct comes faith…while the healthy common folk instinctively close their ranks to form a community of people’ (under a leader it goes without saying) ‘intellectuals run this way and that, like hens in a poultry yard. With them one cannot make history; they cannot be used as elements composing a community” (Huxley). Insisting the importance of community lowers the chance of individuals disrupting the smooth movement of the system. When individuals do find themselves alone in the crowd, Ford has built into the World State a place for them to go to keep quiet and out of the way of normal progress of the World State. Keeping intelligence at bay through the method of conditioning keeps questions from being asked and ideals from being challenged. Finally ensuring repetition of the rules to ensure your happiness, through hypnopædia is like brainwashing but more subtle. Through these methods that have been unable to succeed in reality, the leaders of the World State were able to control the masses through their ideals. The only hiccup they came across was the behavior, questions, and so on of John the Savage. But as nature runs its course, so did John eliminating the World State’s problem before it became something they had to deal with.


 * Works Cited:**

Earl Jr., Riggins R. //Dark Symbols, Obscure Signs.// Knoxville, Tennessee: The University of Tennessee Press, 2003. Print.

Huxley, Aldous. "Propaganda Under a Dictatorship." //Brave New World Revisited.// 1958. 28 December 2010. . Pierce, Yolanda. //Hell Without Fires.// Gainesville, Florida: University Press of Florida, 2005. Print.

Neugroschel, Joachim. //Radiant Days, Haunted Nights.// New York: Overlook Duckworth, Peter Mayer Publishers Incorporated, 2005. Print.

**Works Consulted:**

Huxley, Aldous. //Brave New World and Brave New World Revisited.// New York: HarperCollins Publishers Inc., 2004. Print.

Silier, Yildiz. //Freedom: Political, Metaphysical, Negative and Positive.// Burlington, Vermont: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2005. Print. Warner, Richard. //Freedom, Enjoyment, and Happiness.// Ithaca, New York and London: Cornell University Press, 1987. Print.

**Annotated Bibliographies:**

**Pope, Stephen J. //The Ethics of Aquinas//. Washington D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2002. Print.**

<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">//Excellent source, Overview and explanation of classical work, Topic sections, Index, 496 pages// <span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">This book looks at the theologian, Thomas Aquinas' understanding of morality as it functions with God. The ethics of Aquinas are broken down in sections and described in plain language yet obviously scholarly. Interpretations are provided on Aquinas' work, //Summa Theologiae,// to help readers understand the structure and content of his most famous theological work. This anthology is particularly interesting to me because it looks at happiness and its connection to God. In the subsection, //The Attainment of Happiness// on page 65 this quote could add value to my paper, "Thomas follows this with an investigation of the possibility of achieving complete happiness. For Thomas, the critical factors are the human intellect and will, which are characterized by their ability to strive for and grasp the universal good. The consequences for this fundamental openness or receptivity of the person for the infinite essence of God are obvious...The one who strives for the good in this life would not be identical with the one who views the infinite goodness of God in eternity."Although based off of a prestigious philosopher, priest, and theologian from the 13th century, the editors assure the wording is not too overwhelming nor keeps you in a black hole if you have not read any of Aquinas' work before.

<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">**Leary, Mark R., and Hoyle, Rick H., eds. //Handbook of Individual Differences in Social Behavior//. New York and London: The Guilford Press, 2009. Print.**

<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">//Good source, Sections on various personality traits, Subject index, 624 pages// <span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">Professors of Psychology contributed to this handbook to provide a comprehensive examination of approximately forty personality characteristics. These professors studied these topics through behavioral research. Many scholars in this field are interested in comparing these traits with individual differences in people relating to their thoughts, emotions, behaviors or physiological responses. To preface their findings on this, an overview of what is known about each personality variable is included under seven different dispositions. As of right now, the sections on Happiness, Depression, Loneliness, Belonging Motivation, and Power Motivation will apply most to my paper. The Cognitive Disposition would also be helpful to look at since throughout __Brave New World__ people are controlled through their cognition. I ranked this source as 'good' versus a higher rank because there is a lot of scientific text that would only be fully understood by someone who is in the field. Reading this source without much knowledge of psychology, the scientific references interrupt me from grasping and taking away the meaning that is trying to be conveyed.

<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">**Neugroschel, Joachim. //Radiant Days, Haunted Nights.// New York: Overlook Duckworth, Peter Mayer Publishers Incorporated, 2005. Print.**

<span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;">// Fair source, Fiction folktales from Yiddish folk literature, Particular folktale that relates to topic of paper, Translation so possibility of misconstrued meaning, 429 pages // <span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"> "A tale of a King who forced the Jews to convert" by Rabbi Nakhman of Braslev (1772-1810) <span style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;"> This tale from yiddish folk literature explains how the king forbid his people to be Jews. They needed to convert or move away. Some people moved away but those that did not want to lose their wealth stayed and were forced to convert. Of those that stayed, they decided they were going to kill the king because they were so angry at him. One of them decided to tell the king of this plan instead because he thought it would be better for the people ona whole, because without a king the people would not know what to do. The king said he would grant this man one wish and the man asked to be able to be a Jew in public. After this king died his son revoked this wish since it was not him that granted it. The king did everything to keep himself safe from the bad omens but still missed the most important part of the omen. Due to missing this, him and his family were killed in a fire. This story is an example of how forcing people to do what it is you think is good for the people, actually is not and will backfire in the end, as did this story for the king. As for the man who wanted to be a Jew in public, he was not malicious yet was clever and received the better end of the stick after being patient and not expecting that he deserved anything more than what his elders/people in power/the kind said because he knows he should respect him due to his position (even if you don't understand why he became king and not you, sometimes that is just life especially depending on what country you are from).

=<span style="font-size: 1.4em; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 5px;">** Brave New World and Brave New World //Revisited//  ** = =<span style="font-size: 1.4em; margin: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 5px;">** By Aldous Huxley ** =

__Draft 2 (copied over, see History)__

__Draft 1 (copied over, see History)__

__Trying to figure out the point of my paper by writing out different thesis ideas/statements:__

1. Europeans forced their religious belief on African Americans just as Mustapha Mond forced absolute happiness on the people of Brave New World. Forcing your ideal way of life on other without letting them decide from themselves will not create the outcome you desire because people are not all wired the same. Someone will retaliate. 2. What you think is ideal is not, it’s just your opinion. Ideals: There is no way to measure ideals for a whole people because everyone is wired differently and Ideals can only be opinions not facts. 3. Once in power, people believe their ideals are ideal for the people they are ruling over and try to make them utilize their ideals as well. Yet because an ideal is just an opinion, it does not prove successful when tried over a whole population of people

+ One/your ideal is not ideal for everyone + Everyone’s ideals differ just like every person differs __Bibliography__ Pierce, Yolanda. //Hell Without Fires.// Gainesville, Florida: University Press of Florida, 2005. Print. Earl Jr., Riggins R. //Dark Symbols, Obscure Signs.// Knoxville, Tennessee: The University of Tennessee Press, 2003. Print.

People in power should not impose their ideals on the people they rule.

A) So why do people choose to assume power over other people? - Because they think it will give them a better life  - They enjoy ruling over others  - They want everything to be as they want it to be  - They think they are right and therefore everyone should follow their ideas.  - "Stanley Elkins was another major white historian, prior to Genovese." (Earl 9)  "His primary thesis was that masters had unilateral power in shaping the slave's personality. The very nature of this uncontestable power created a pathological kind of paternalism between masters and slaves. This relation of dominance depersonalized the slaves to a stereotypical Sambo-type status. It produced illusions of grandeur on both sides of the pathological relationship: In the slave it produced a false sense of absolute dependence upon the master; in the master it produced a false sense of absolute self-sufficiency.  (Sambo, the typical plantation slave, was docile but irresponsible, loyal but lazy, humble but chronically given to lying and stealing; his behavior was full of infantile silliness and his talk inflated with childish exaggeration." - He was dependent on his master. (Earl 10) - ANOTHER LOOK: +"Whites seemed unequivocally certain in their belief that God had created them superior to those of African origin. " "It is apparent in the literature, that those masters who took seriously the moral teachings of Christianity continued to struggle with the metaphysical and ethical questions about the slave's being. What this meant, in fact, was that Christian slave masters could never be content to see the enslavement of Africans as being a mere economic or political issue, despite the fact that slave trade and slave labor compromised the backbone of the economy of the Christian. Slavery was a social problem that required their ethical and theological engagement." (Earl 10) - “Christian masters’ contradictory theological understanding about the blackness of the African slave’s body in relationship to his and her soul left them in a moral quandary [dilemma]. The ideal Christian’s quandary – body versus soul – is reflected in the foloowing question: Can we teach slaves to think of themselves as being absolutely worthless before God without being guilty of thinking of ourselves more highly than we ought before God without? This was a theological issue at its core; it constituted a hermeneutical circle of double negativity. TO teach slaves that they were “black of body” and blacker of soul” was to teach them the theory of double self-negation. It required that slaves think of themselves as having only negative value both before their masters and God. - “This truth is illustrated by the following prayer lines of a white missionary preacher composed for plantation masters to teach their slaves: “//O Thou great God, the Makers of all creatures, I, a poor black sinner, black in body and still blacker in sin…//”32 These lines required slaves to denounce themselves interiorly and exteriorly, body and soul, as being worthless in God’s sight. **Requiring slaves to ritualize their own inferiority in these prayer lines**, masters were affirming their belief that white skin made them superior in the sign of God. Such spurious **interpretation contributed to whites’ false sense of divinely ordained preeminence over those of African origin**.” (Earl 22) B) Why did the Europeans use Christianity as one of their chosen mechanisms to gain power over slaves? - Its values are less violent than religions from Africa. The Europeans thought this would stop these African-Americans from using their violent ways to retaliate against them.  - People all over the world believe in Christianity so it is a legitimate ideal to follow and educate these people on so they would be more like Europeans.  - “Christianity represents a contradictory faith for African Americans; its signs, symbols, words, and messages were used to physically and mentally enslave. When all other arguments for continuing chattel slavery failed, the Bible’s teaching for “slaves to obey their masters” succeeded.” (Pierce 3)  C) How did slaves react to the Europeans imposing their religion on them? - Some accepted it, seeing truth and value to it within their life. - Some pretended to accept it to be free from persecution, since it was expected that you accept Christianity. Instead they lived out Christianity in front of their masters and practiced their rituals behind closed/secret doors. - Some out rightly denied it, like they did slavery and escaped to the North or were killed in the South for disobedience. - "Eugene Genovese, a contemporary historian, has carefully reconstructed a new way of understanding how slaves and masters acted and reacted toward each other. His study allows us to see how slaves, using their masters' fragmented teaching of the Bible, spiritually resisted their masters' reduction of them to mere puppetry status. This fact made it very difficult for masters to gain absolute control over their slaves." (Earl 9) + There was a necessity for mutual compromise between both masters and slaves. - "Genovese acknowledged that slaves extracted from their masters' Christianity a radically alternative vision of THEMSELVES, God, and community." (Earl 9) - Once slaves escaped to the north, they still had to convince Northerners that “I feel therefore I am.” It was a lot for a slave to say “//I-am-my-body.”// So they felt writing an autobiography would show that they moved from the illiterate to the literate. (Earl 105, 106) - “Being converted by God meant that God had freed the slave’s latent self to rebel against all forms of oppression. This is what is heard in the testimony of slaves who had the courage to passively resist their master even at the cost of being physically beaten. Nothing is more powerful in the slaves’ narratives than their testimonies of how conversion to Jesus empowered them to withstand the master’s whip upon their backs. Rather than a deterrent ot their faith, physical persecution apparently became its principal motivator [INTERESTING]. Identification with Jesus as God’s embodied sufferer gave slaves the courage to sacrifice their own bodies for Jesus’ gift of freedom. It often lit a passionate fire in their souls that drove them to take a daring posture of courage. Neither the driver’s lashes upon their backs, nor salt and paper rubbed into their wounds could keep them from their resolve to follow Jesus [GRAPHIC IMAGING].” (Earl 127) - “Appeals to their masters’ consciences through love and forgiveness became the most powerful method that many slaves used to relate to them.” (Earl 128) - Charlie’s account of when he reencountered his slave master and told him he forgave him for all the wrong doings he did against him. “While the manifestation of religious faith for Charlie allows him to forgive, he does not forget. Charlie’s spiritual conversion is of such a fundamentally singular kind that he is able to live with a memory of hate, //but not with the hate itself.//” (Pierce 4) D) What types of values were imposed or tried to convert? - Ch. 16: "Because our world is not the same as Othello's world. You can't make flivvers without steel–and you can't make tragedies without social instability. The world's stable now. People are happy; they get what they want, and they never want what they can't get. They're well off; they're safe; they're never ill; they're not afraid of death; they're blissfully ignorant of passion and old age; they're plagued with no mothers or fathers; they've got no wives, or children, or lovers to feel strongly about; they're so conditioned that they practically can't help behaving as they ought to behave. And if anything should go wrong, there's //soma//." - Mustapha Mond  - Ch. 16: "Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the over-compensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand." - Mustapha Mond - Even after slaves escaped and were in the north, Northerners reiterated that without God, and God converting you, you would not have made it to the north. When an ex-slave wrote about how they needed to have faith in themselves to escape and that was the same as having faith in God because he worked through them, that ensured to the white Northerners that the ex-slave was trustworthy. They still made sure that the ex-slaves knew that this was not possible if it was not for God (again lowering their self-affirmation ability). (Earl 124, 105)  - That slaves and ex-slaves realized they could not do anything by themselves, suppressing their self-affirmation. (Earl 105)  E) What method did Brave New World use to impose their values on the people?  - Ch. 16: "It's an absurdity. An Alpha-decanted, Alpha-conditioned man would go mad if he had to do Epsilon Semi-Moron work–go mad, or start smashing things up. Alphas can be completely socialized–but only on condition that you make them do Alpha work." - Mustapha Mond - The idea that you have to set up a hierarchy throughout the population for control to be able to work. With equal ability, control will be assumed throughout the entirety of the educated and creative mind. Someone has to be in control, as was seen in the yiddish folktale "A tale of a King who forced Jews to convert". The Jewish person that told the king that his people were planning to kill him did this because he knew that someone had to be in power or all would go to hell, which was worse than having to convert away from the Jewish religion.*  - Ch. 16: "Only an Epsilon can be expected to make Epsilon sacrifices, for the good reason that for him they aren't sacrifices; they're the line of least resistance. His conditioning has laid down rails along which he's got to run. He can't help himself; he's foredoomed." - Mustapha Mond F) What did they find successful about using that method?  - Ch. 16 in my own wording: After an experiment that put 22,000 Alphas on the same island, 19,000 were killed and "the survivors unanimously petitioned the World Controllers to resume the government of the island. Which they did. And that was the end of the only society of Alphas that the world has ever seen." - Mustapha Mond  + Therefore the controllers and the Alphas found that it is successful when you have a hierarchy of people, not just one class of people. As it is in America, as it was in the Yiddish folktale, and as it was when the Europeans brought the African-Americans to America to be slaves. There has to be someone in charge or nothing will get done. People need jobs, because otherwise everyone could choose the same job and the others would not get done and worse the people would fight over who gets what job, when they are already moving into position of that job. G) How did the people react to this method? - John’s reaction  - Mustapha Mond’s reaction  - Bernard’s reaction  - Ch. 16: Mustapha Mond says, ""So you don't much like civilization, Mr. Savage."  The savage says, "No."  'Bernard started and looked horrified. What would the Controller think? To be labelled as the friend of a man who said that he didn't like civilization–said it openly and, of all people, to the Controller–it was terrible. "But, John," he began. A look from Mustapha Mond reduced him to an abject silence.'  - This is an example of how Bernard does not want to cross the Controller. What would the controller think? BNW has controlled Bernard to think the controller will think something ghastly of him and horrid outcomes will come to fruition. Yet the controller doesn't really think those things, he only puts them into action so as to keep the people in BNW in line and under control. - Helmholtz’s reaction - The general public - Linda (John’s mom) - The woman who Bernard liked then John liked H) How were the methods used to control the people from BNW similar to the methods used to control the slaves? I) How are the reactions of the two sets of people similar? - Reasons for not sharing "Othello" with people of BNW: because it's old, beautiful, and the people would not understand it

People in power should not impose their ideals on the people they rule/below them because each person is wired differently and needs to have some say in deciding what brings them happiness.

__**Another Annotated Bibliography**__


 * Neugroschel, Joachim. //Radiant Days, Haunted Nights.// New York: Overlook Duckworth, Peter Mayer Publishers Incorporated, 2005. Print.**

//Fair source, Fiction folktales from Yiddish folk literature, Particular folktale that relates to topic of paper, Translation so possibility of misconstrued meaning, 429 pages// This tale from yiddish folk literature explains how the king forbid his people to be Jews. They needed to convert or move away. Some people moved away but those that did not want to lose their wealth stayed and were forced to convert. Of those that stayed, they decided they were going to kill the king because they were so angry at him. One of them decided to tell the king of this plan instead because he thought it would be better for the people ona whole, because without a king the people would not know what to do. The king said he would grant this man one wish and the man asked to be able to be a Jew in public. After this king died his son revoked this wish since it was not him that granted it. The king did everything to keep himself safe from the bad omens but still missed the most important part of the omen. Due to missing this, him and his family were killed in a fire. - This story is an example of how forcing people to do what it is you think is good for the people, actually is not and will backfire in the end, as did this story for the king. As for the man who wanted to be a Jew in public, he was not malicious yet was clever and received the better end of the stick after being patient and not expecting that he deserved anything more than what his elders/people in power/the kind said because he knows he should respect him due to his position (even if you don't understand why he became king and not you, sometimes that is just life especially depending on what country you are from).
 * "A tale of a King who forced the Jews to convert" by Rabbi Nakhman of Braslev (1772-1810)

Fake Happiness. People impose their idea of happiness on others (1) and expect them to find happiness through it as well (2) without realizing other people may not find the same happiness in that. (3) especially when in roles of power Thesis: Throughout BNW, ideals are forced upon the people as was Christianity forced upon African-Americans when they came to America, yet "ideal" ideals pushed upon others never seem to work out in the end.

Variation of Thesis: Through colonization, Europeans tried to control the Indians and Slaves through teaching them about Christianity. Assuming ideals anyone other than themselves, lives for cannot have any worth in them. It isn't until long that both parties see that assuming your ideals fit with another person's life, does not work and all will break loose.

People feel the need to control others is they have a power hunger in them by forcing their happiness of them. We do it in today's society by convincing people that they should try playing soccer because we love it so they will definitely love it. But no it doesn't work that way. Each of us has to find our own happiness. Sharing that happiness with others or keeping to yourself adds to the ability to be happy or not.

Do you desire to be alone or have a need for community?

Brave New World – Bernard, flying over the ocean, wanting to get away and contemplate life

=
For Paper --> Hermitage...when people go to be just with them and God in nature. <--<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">This idea here could be spun off of where people run to when they feel so enclosed in a world of fake happiness, that they do not know anywhere else to run than to God, even if they have never believed in him before. now they are desperate. John does it in the novel =====

The idea of individual happiness and societal happiness are two different ideas. Imposing your ideas of happiness on another individual because it is what you think is right is what a lot people in Brave New World do. But people have different ideas of happiness and what makes them happy which is why not everyone is happy in Brave New World. This is why there are outliers like Bernard in the beginning of the novel, that do not find happiness in what everyone else in BNW does. This is also seen with John later on.
 * Brainstorming with Oliver**

1. people force other people to be like them but when it does not work out it is worse off than before. > // - Savages should become Christians, one way to control them // > <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Again another idea that came up, is how Brave New World is related to the movie "The Truman Show". > > > > > > > > Freedom, Truth, and Happiness are word we are all familiar with and have a connection with more likely than not. The connections could be good or they could be bad, either way these words are fundamentals that make up every day life. Being from America we experience freedom as a positive attribute/trait to the United States of America. Freedom of speech, religion, press, and freedom to vote are not all characteristics that every country experiences. Some people live under strong dictatorships or governments and associate the word Freedom with death. And at the same time people have different feelings about truth and the matters behind truth, which should all be truthful of course, right? Truth can be a scary concept. It can be better to not know the truth because it is not always a lovely topic; the old saying still sticks, truth hurts. Yet if you want to live a real life, you need truth. You can play around the falsities life up chucks at you but at the end of the day when you are standing in the same room as your roommate, of whom you lost her favorite ring, you know why she is being so quiet. She may not tell you as to not cause controversy, especially if it has already been brought up, but the waters have not been cleared yet and until they are, you are living a lie. That is if you pretend everything is fine, or ignore the situation. Then you may not be living a lie but you are not living for real, fake, possibly. Happiness can be fake and can be real. If it is real then you know it is real, if it fake though, you may just be hiding behind the smile of your face, pretending nothing is wrong because you really do what to believe that. Unfortunately sooner or later it comes out from deep down inside you how happy you really are. You make it come out as you decide how to live your life, happily or unhappily happy. > > We each have our own perspective and our experiences help make up what our perspectives are. Depending on what they are, decides how when you fall in the spectrum of feelings towards these words. If you had to choose, which value would you say is the most important to the value of life? Within Brave New World, this answer would vary. Because control over the people is possible they cannot decide if they want to live fake lives or in reality. For the people being controlled these words are all somewhat fake in their lives. Freedom, to make them think they had freedom to choose but they have been brainwashed to decide what it is their caste should decide. Truth, they will never know the truth yet they feel as though they know all there ever was, because that is how they were conditioned to think. And finally happiness, and how fake theirs is, is unfortunate. The feelies do not produce anywhere near as much happiness as reading a Shakespeare novel, yet they do not know that so they are content with what it is they know. No reason to get upset over anything with what they have ahead of them, which is everything. > > > ===Brave New World=== > Trying to figure out which of, freedom, truth, or happiness is more important in the novel. To Mustapha Mond, happiness is most important, to John truth is most important and maybe freedom > > > ===Research=== > "Yet systems that rely too heavily on coercive force are inefficient. They are wasteful of resources, breed popular discontent, and are frequently unstable for that reason. As Laura ANker, Peter Seybold, and Michael Schwartz (1987) argue, "Violence and other means of repression (e.g., court cases, public denunciation, and executive orders) may prove counterproductive dampening the enthusiasm of, r even alienating, those who would other support" a particular social structure (99). //This is where "internal coercion" or "ideology" becomes significant - guiding behavior through shaping ideas, producing consent by structuring thought and feeling"// (Hogan 58). > > > ===Research From __Freedom: Political, Metaphysical, Negative, and Positive__ by Yildiz Silier === > __Negative conception of Freedom, Kant's idea__ > - Why freedom would not be the most important aspect of life > Freedom > - absence of something > 1. - one can do what he want without being constrained or interfered with by others > 2. - natural freedom that we naturally own/have but external cases try to restrict it > - assumption of an inevitable antagonism between the individual and the society > > Freedom and Coercion > Coercion - constraints force people to do certain things > - restraints prevent people from performing certain actions > > Freedom does NOT mean having the ability to do whatever you want. > > __Positive conception of Freedom, Greene's idea__ > Freedom - neg. aspect: not submitting to arbitrary will of another > - pos. aspect: rational self-determination and self-activity > - identical to rational and moral (another philosopher's idea, not Greene) > > Greene's Idea: > - involves self-consciousness > - abilities can only develop thorugh social relations > BUT a social achievement > - state has pos. duties to promote social considtion of freedom > - indiviaual freedom should be protected from interventions and help promote by state, which acts in accordance to the people > 3 aspects of Freedom > 1. very closely connected with self-realization > 2. enjoy with others (can't take away other freedom to give yourself more) (self is socially embedded) > 3. relates to power to achieve self development > > Basically you cannot have freedom with an expectation or hope for common good. > > > > > > ===Topics --> Thesis:=== > - How, through colonization, the colonizers tried to control the Indians and Slaves through teaching them Christianity. Christianity is a much less violent religion with morals rooted in forgiveness and love versus the revenge they would have taken on the colonizers. > - Are you happier alone or in sharing your life with others? Can you be happy in loneliness? Can you be lonely when surrounded by people? Can you be happy when lonely? How about when you are along? What is the difference? > - What is the purpose of life? Happiness? Living for God? Living for someone or something else? __What is more important to people, happiness, freedom and/or truth?__ //REFER TO: BNW pg. 162-163, 152, and the following sections: 1) When the Savage, Bernard, and Helmholtz were in Mond's office 2) When Mustapha and John had an argument in Mond's office 3) The savage's "hermitage" to/for himself// > > > =====For Paper --> Hermitage...when people go to be just with them and God in nature.===== > =====The viewer gives it the meaning. (with photos)===== > =====Ask yourself during your writing process: "Am I doing more than just reporting or comparison?"===== > ===== See Home page for Format of FINAL which is due so have completed by Sunday December 5, 2010 at 11:59pm . The writer's memo should be as a new discussion thread on my wiki page. ===== > > > **Possible Sources** > //Freedom, Enjoyment and Happiness// by Richard Warner > //The Culture of Conformity// by Patrick Colm Hogan > //Into the Wild// by Jon Krakauer - when John goes on hermitage at the end of the book looking for beauty and to be pure and alone, this is a lot like Alex Vandertramp's experience in this book. Especially when John realizes what he did the day before, that is like Alex realizing "you have to share happiness if you want to have it," both momentous moments in their lives, somewhat of a climax in each book. > //Animal and the Moral Community// by Gary Steiner > //Freedom: Political, Metaphysical, Negative, and Positive// by Yildiz Silier > //The Little Philosophy Book// by Robert C. Solomon
 * Outline**
 * What I am trying to say here is that; Person No. Z thinks their ideas are better than person no. Y's ideas. Therefore person no. Z believes their ideas should be implemented over person no. Y's ideas to greater benefit both of them. Yet person no. Z is thinking one-mindedly when he/she does not consider others' ideas. The collaboration of ideas is more beneficial, if looking to benefit a group (or even just one person) because it brings in different perspectives. <-->

__**Annotated Bibliographies**__


 * Pope, Stephen J. //The Ethics of Aquinas//. Washington D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2002. Print.**

//Excellent source, Overview and explanation of classical work, Topic sections, Index, 496 pages// This book looks at the theologian, Thomas Aquinas' understanding of morality as it functions with God. The ethics of Aquinas are broken down in sections and described in plain language yet obviously scholarly. Interpretations are provided on Aquinas' work, //Summa Theologiae,// to help readers understand the structure and content of his most famous theological work. This anthology is particularly interesting to me because it looks at happiness and its connection to God. In the subsection, //The Attainment of Happiness// on page 65 this quote could add value to my paper, "Thomas follows this with an investigation of the possibility of achieving complete happiness. For Thomas, the critical factors are the human intellect and will, which are characterized by their ability to strive for and grasp the universal good. The consequences for this fundamental openness or receptivity of the person for the infinite essence of God are obvious...The one who strives for the good in this life would not be identical with the one who views the infinite goodness of God in eternity."Although based off of a prestigious philosopher, priest, and theologian from the 13th century, the editors assure the wording is not too overwhelming nor keeps you in a black hole if you have not read any of Aquinas' work before.


 * Leary, Mark R., and Hoyle, Rick H., eds. //Handbook of Individual Differences in Social Behavior//. New York and London: The Guilford Press, 2009. Print.**

//Good source, Sections on various personality traits, Subject index, 624 pages// Professors of Psychology contributed to this handbook to provide a comprehensive examination of approximately forty personality characteristics. These professors studied these topics through behavioral research. Many scholars in this field are interested in comparing these traits with individual differences in people relating to their thoughts, emotions, behaviors or physiological responses. To preface their findings on this, an overview of what is known about each personality variable is included under seven different dispositions. As of right now, the sections on Happiness, Depression, Loneliness, Belonging Motivation, and Power Motivation will apply most to my paper. The Cognitive Disposition would also be helpful to look at since throughout __Brave New World__ people are controlled through their cognition. I ranked this source as 'good' versus a higher rank because there is a lot of scientific text that would only be fully understood by someone who is in the field. Reading this source without much knowledge of psychology, the scientific references interrupt me from grasping and taking away the meaning that is trying to be conveyed.

**Warner, Richard. //Freedom, Enjoyment, and Happiness.// Ithaca, New York and London: Cornell University Press, 1987. Print.**

The author talks about the philosopher Kant and the two different types of freedom we have. One of our freedoms is based off our preferred motives, our judgments, and the other is our non preferred motives with desires that are sourced from our animal nature.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There was a silence. In spite of their sadness–because of it, even; for their sadness was the symptom of their love for one another–the three young men were happy.
 * Quotes from Chapter 18**

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">He had almost finished whittling the stave into shape, when he realized with a start that he was singing-singing! It was as though, stumbling upon himself from the outside, he had suddenly caught himself out, taken himself flagrantly at fault. Guiltily he blushed. After all, it was not to sing and enjoy himself that he had come here. It was to escape further contamination by the filth of civilized life; it was to be purified and made good; it was actively to make amends. He realized to his dismay that, absorbed in the whittling of his bow, he had forgotten what he had sworn to himself he would constantly remember–poor Linda, and his own murderous unkindness to her, and those loathsome twins, swarming like lice across the mystery of her death, insulting, with their presence, not merely his own grief and repentance, but the very gods themselves. He had sworn to remember, he had sworn unceasingly to make amends. And there was he, sitting happily over his bow-stave, singing, actually singing. …

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">He went indoors, opened the box of mustard, and put some water to boil on the fire. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">- He does not get that Jesus died for our sins so we can be forgiven for our sins. We do not need to make up for all of them, that would be impossible, just as it is to be pure.

Going off of my brainstorming with Oliver, this is shown in the novel in chapter 16 when the Bernard, Helmholtz, and John are talking to Mustapha Mond. They are bringing up how Shakespeare brings you more happiness than the feelies and Mond agrees with them but says those are the things we have to give up to have happiness all the time even if it is fake. I need to finish reading this and then I think I will finally have somewhere in the novel to base my ideas off of and I can find relevant research to go with it.
 * Yet again, more Brainstorming**

Trying to explain to some of my peers what this wiki space is, we described it as the life of our paper. Instead of in multiple word documents or on loose leaf sheets of paper, everything that occurs in the life of this paper occurs here. So we or maybe just I decided to make an image that embodies this paper. Like is done in second life or wii, giving a personality and a being to an otherwise inanimate object. Meet (Title of paper: TBA).

The idea of individual happiness and societal happiness are two different ideas. Imposing your ideas of happiness on another individual because it is what you think is right is what a lot people in Brave New World do. But people have different ideas of happiness and what makes them happy which is why not everyone is happy in Brave New World. This is why there are outliers like Bernard in the beginning of the novel, that do not find happiness in what everyone else in BNW does. This is also seen with John later on.
 * Brainstorming with Oliver**

1. people force other people to be like them but when it does not work out it is worse off than before.
 * Outline**
 * What I am trying to say here is that; Person No. Z thinks their ideas are better than person no. Y's ideas. Therefore person no. Z believes their ideas should be implemented over person no. Y's ideas to greater benefit both of them. Yet person no. Z is thinking one-mindedly when he/she does not consider others' ideas. The collaboration of ideas is more beneficial, if looking to benefit a group (or even just one person) because it brings in different perspectives. <-- somewhat of a THESIS

// - BNW – satire on America // // - Savages should become Christians, one way to control them // // - Throughout colonization people always were consistent with the idea of converting the savage residents to Christians because then they could control them by telling them that it is God’s way to do things nice and this way. Unlike the African religions that would make the people go against the big wigs with hatchets, because that is how their religion portrays how to approach this idea. //

Today in class Prof. Carleton told us about how there is a group of autistic people who have started a blog or wiki to talk about they would rather not be conformed. Why do they have to take all this medicine? Why can't they be able to express their ideas, as long as they are not hurting anyone. Let them experience their different mindset. The fact that this group of autistic people were self-aware enough to recognize this is first reason to largely consider what they are saying. Secondly it makes people who have thought autism is a disease that needs to be treated by medicine, think again. This relates to BNW in that people are all expected to be the same. The Controller believes that everyone wants to be happy, when maybe the controller's ideas are incorrect and not everyone does want to be happy. The controller as well as others in similar positions to his, try to control people so they can have everything the way they want it. Yet they are not considering other people's ideas. Someone may bring up an idea that they like more than their idea. If they are trying to have the best idea (which leads to more benefits) then they are missing out but if they just want control over others, then this is the method in which they are doing so.
 * Reflection on class Thurs. Nov. 18, 2010**

Offshoring: The Next Industrial Revolution? <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 9.35pt; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; padding: 0px;">Alan S. Blinder <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 8pt; line-height: 9.35pt; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; padding: 0px;">Page 113 of 113-128

// [|Foreign Affairs] // Vol. 85, No. 2 (Mar. - Apr., 2006), pp. 113-128 Published by: [|Council on Foreign Relations] http://www.jstor.org/stable/20031915

Brainstorming session with Librarian, Marcia Whitehead <mwhitehe@richmond.edu>
// - BNW – satire on America // - Taylor had 12 children and tried to apply his techniques on his children - CQ – focused on contemporary issues, want to see how those issues in the past are now represented - Resistance to EU // - Savages should become Christians, one way to control them // // - Throughout colonization people always were consistent with the idea of converting the savage residents to Christians because then they could control them by telling them that it is God’s way to do things nice and this way. Unlike the African religions that would make the people go against the big wigs with hatchets, because that is how their religion portrays how to approach this idea. // - Library Website --> Subject & Course guides --> English --> English 103 --> Getting Started --> Academic Search Complete -->At the top of this database click on "Choose Databases" --> "America: History & Life" and "Historical Abstracts" are two databases that would give me information on //Colonization and World Government//



<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">I clicked on "File" because I was going to put a file in there but wanted to see what was already in there, expecting the normal pre-loaded photos from the computer to be the only ones, and I found this photo. I think someone using wiki spaces for this paper already used it because most of the other files in there were pictures that related to Brave New World but I think it is interesting so I wanted to comment on it. I see Bernard as the yellow smiley face I actually see him as the only one not smiling, still yellow, and the rest of them blue. This is because he can feel his real feelings so from the inside he is yellow, feeling not happy (another color) but not sad, which is signified by the blue color. The rest of the people in the controlled state of a world are blue because from the inside they really are sad but they do not show their real feelings to themselves or other people. But on the outside they are smiling because "Life is Wonderful". Whereas Bernard shows people how he is unhappy with his life from the outside, which gives him the frowning face in the picture. But the picture does not depict this. What it does depict I would like to think occurs by the end of the novel, but I am in doubt of that happening.

Brainstorming
So I have had The Jungle Book song "I wanna be like you" stuck in my head for d <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">ays now. And it gave me an idea that relates to civilization and savagery. Bernard wants to be like the savage (citizens, can you consider the savage as citizens?), or maybe not, but he wants to break free from the civilization that he lives in now. Oliver mentioned though that he was unhappy because he doesn't take soma and if he would just take soma then he would want to live where he is now and be happy. This made me think of "Hakuna Matata" from the Lion King that basically says Life is all good, especially for those that live in this civilization IF you take soma. Yet Bernard does not want to accept taking soma to be happy. It would be very interesting if there could be an analysis of Disney ideas intertwined with Brave New World ideas but that could be a stretch. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Again another idea that came up, is how Brave New World is related to the movie "The Truman Show".
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Another idea that could be spun off of this is the idea of colonization, which Prof. Carleton brought up after thinking about The Jungle Book and how people think "Oh Everyone wants to be like me." This brings in another Disney movie, Pocahontas, which is basically a true story based off of the Europeans landing in Jamestown, VA and encountering the Native Americans, Pocahontas being one of them.

Possible Ideas
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Civilization vs. Savagery <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">World Government - Bernard and Lenina's home & Home of the Savage, how does one government control both? That would be the definition of a world government would it not? Do people like the Controller and the DHC want to control the whole world, even the savage reservation? <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Taylorism - This word reminds me of the Jack Johnson's song "Taylor". It would be interesting to see if the definition of Taylorism and the song have anything in common at all. The word alone intrigues me to look into this idea more. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Technology & Survival <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Class Consciousness & Sociology <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Psychology & Obedience <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Drug use & motivation <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Sexuality & repression <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Religion & religious experience/Ritual & ecstasy - These two ideas go together I think because religions and religious experience often have many rituals that make up what they are. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 120%;">Shakespeare